The Nation's Health

"28 year old female, lacking experience....."

Right! Rant time! This post was inspired by a twitter conversation with @butwhymummywhy about being judged as being too young! (see her musing on the same subject here) Tell me, who here has been told they were too young to do something? Which mothers have faced criticism for being to young to have a baby? I'm not talking the 13 and 14 year olds, they ARE too young. I'm not even talking about the '16 and pregnant' ones. I'm talking those in the low 20's. At what age is the 'right age'? Who has not been trusted at work because of their age? Who's opinions have been discounted because they were 'too young' or 'inexperienced'? Personally, I've been on the receiving end of a number of comments about being 'too young' throughout my relatively short life. Being a parent at 23?! What was I thinking! Far too young! Right?! Let me put this too you....

Let's say I went to university, graduated at 21, got a job, worked for 4 years, had a committed relationship and then had a baby at 27. Is that acceptable? Yes it is! How about leaving school at 16, working for 3 years, buying my own house, had a committed relationship, worked for another 4 years and had a baby at 23. I was earning more than most of the 23 year olds with degrees. I owned a house and had 7 years working and living as an adult under my belt. Am I any less qualified? Apparently so! Surely my degree from the University of Life counts for something?! It really pisses me off when age is used to undermine, with nothing to back it up other than a date of birth.

Now take the work place. My work place. The ambulance service is a very strange working environment. There is a bizarre mentality amongst many that the more years of service you have done, the better you are. There is a culture of looking after the 'long timers' and the 'newbies' can deal with it. The relief rota is a case in point. Working 7/10 weekends indefinitely just because you are new if fine for a few years but 3? 4? 5? 6 years? When are you experienced enough to not have to do the shifts that the experienced staff don't want to?!

"68 year old female, chest pain"

I was working with a guy who had done 25 years on ambulances. The shift had been painful. He didn't have the time of day for me because I was a student. At no point did he bother to ask where in my training I was. He opened the days conversation with 'are you one of jumped up Uni medics or one of the Playmobil Paras?'. There is a lot of ambiguity in the service about university students. They are seen as stuck up 'know it alls'. OK, some are but similarly there are 'old hands' or 'dinosaurs' who swagger around with just as much self importance. It's not the training, it's the personality. Difference is I wouldn't call them a derogatory name to their face! This guy was giving me one of two labels regardless of what kind of clinician I was. For the record I was a 'Playmobil Para'. I get this label because my route to becoming a paramedic had a different name for the final exam than what used to be done. Therefor it stands to reason that I will be incompetent, useless, untrustworthy, unknowledgeable and a clinical liability. Right?

The hours past with stories about 'back in the day' and instructions not to do too many jobs in the shift etc. I was mocked for being thorough and told my extensive paperwork was a waste of time. I ignored it. It was the expected treatment for a relatively new student. By relatively new, I mean only 2 years. At 4 shifts a week, 10 jobs a shift, that equates to roughly 4,160 patients. In that time I had done 2 ECG recognition courses, a course in Trauma, plenty of home study, clinical updates, reflective practice and some other work related stuff. Yes I was new, yes I was still keen (still am) and no I didn't tell him what I'd done in my spare time.

We arrived on scene at the patients house and as the 'newbie' I carried all the bags while he followed with his hands in his pockets. The patient looked like crap. Pale, sweating and complaining of central chest pain radiating to her jaw. I did the ECG, looked at it and KNEW it was heart attack. I passed it to my crew mate of 25 years experience.

"Nah, it's just high take off."

"You can use all the long words you like, that's high take off."

The reason this was a sticking point was, if it WAS a heart attack, we would be travelling a long way to a Heart Attack Centre and would be late off. It is wasn't, and was just high take off, we'd be going to the nearest A & E and would be off on time.

"I've been doing this job for 25 years, you're a student, trust me, it's high take off."

"It's elevation, we are going to the HAC, you can call clinical support if you like. The history matches the ECG."

He muttered something under his breath about 'know it alls' with 'no experience' and stomped off to the cab. We drove to the HAC, the waiting cardiologist looked at the ECG and confirmed it was indeed ST elevation and she was indeed having a heart attack.

Student 1 - 0 25 Years Experience

It made for an awkward journey home. I didn't gloat. I didn't say 'I told you so' but I didn't need to. He just ignored me. The silence was golden. My point isn't that I was great. On a day to day basic his wealth of experience would help him and me in many ways but just because I'm young and new doesn't mean I don't know what I'm doing. He hadn't done any training for years, no continual professional development. Therefor, is 25 years experience just 1 years experience repeated 25 times? I have uppermost respect for people who have done the job for so long but respect still has to be earned. Treating my like an idiot only earned my crewmate disdain. I don't know everything, far far far from it. I'm still learning. I'll always still be learning. The time I don't feel the need to learn more is the time I stop gaining experience.

People should be judged on ability not experience. People should be judged on how how well their children are brought up, not how old the parents are. Experience is relative. It's well known that discriminating against sex, race, religion and sexuality is not acceptable in today's society. Well, age isn't a reason to belittle / dismiss / ignore someone either. To label someone as too young to do something or to have done something, smacks to me as criticism to justify their own choices in life. There is no point in having experience if you've done sod all with it.

Rant over!

Do I have enough experience ranting to call myself a well rounded ranter or am I too young?